Mirror Shards
by Fortune Spirit
Summary: "The reflection in the mirror, it's a pointless façade..."
1. Chapter 1

(Alright, so I know I've been gone a while and I still haven't updated TIF yet, but I thought I'd try starting a new story to get my mind flowing a bit. Most of Chapter Six is done, I just need to add some more to the end because I don't feel like it's quite long enough yet. Also, this chapter is more to gauge your interest. If no one likes it, I won't continue. Good? Alright, enough stalling, onto the story…

~Fortune)

Chapter One

He stared blankly into the silvery surface of the mirror, willing the smile to appear. Every day it got harder but he couldn't afford to let his friends see him like this. He took in a deep breath. Staring at his reflection, he acknowledged the lack of emotion in his emerald eyes. Wishing the light into his dull features was the easy part. The hard part was expelling the feeling of nothingness in his soul.

Giving up on the mask for now, he turned to freshen himself up. His quills were in disarray and his cobalt fur was slightly ruffled and matted – all the signs of disturbed rest. Looks like a splash of water in the face wasn't going to cut it today…

Setting his focus to the shower and the bath behind him, he suppressed the shiver that threatened to creep down his spine when he thought about filling the bath with water. He grimaced; too much water. The shower would be quicker and he had the plus of not having to submerge his body in his most hated thing.

He opened the shower door and glided into the vertical cuboid of glass. Twisting the knob on the shower to turn on the water, he ran his peach hand under the stream to test the temperature. Scalding hot; that's just how he liked it. One of the few things he could feel, he supposed. He felt the water run down his back. He sighed in relief. After letting the water soak into his fur, he reached for the sweet-smelling shampoo sitting in the rack on the wall. He turned the bottle over in his hands and read the label: orange and apple. He squeezed some of the shampoo on to his hands and, trying to ignore the stinging of the cuts he had almost forgotten about, began to run his hands through his quills. The feeling was soothing and he closed his eyes in content, a subtle but genuine smile beginning to emerge on his muzzle. Once he had lathered up the rest of his fur, he gradually began to wash away the sudsy bubbles.

He turned off the shower, reached for the fleecy, bright blue towel on the towel stand and began to dry off his fur. When he was pleased with the dryness of his pelt, he threw the towel back on the stand and made for the bathroom door. On days like this, he was glad to have a bathroom all to himself branching off of his room.

His bedroom wasn't too special. The walls were painted in a navy blue hue. The floorboards were blanketed in a dark grey carpet – he found the carpet useful for when he was leaving or entering his room late at night through the window as it reduced the sound of his footfalls to mere mumbles. Unfortunately, he had been having a lot more trouble with sleep recently. He never really was a heavy sleeper anyway, being on alert for attack at all times helped with _that_, but recently he was really struggling to get some shut-eye. Speaking of which, his bed with its wooden frame sat in the centre of the room against the far wall – one of the only four pieces of furniture in his room. The other three consisted of a beaten up, oak wood desk with a chair to match that had seen some years of ware and a single, full body mirror.

He dove into one of the three drawers on his desk to grab a fresh pair of white gloves and into another one for some new cotton socks. The third drawer, being the only one with a keyhole, was left undisturbed. He sat on the chair beside the desk to pull on his socks before then putting on his gloves. The gloves were soft on the inside, the perfect cushion to his scars, old and new. As he adjusted the gloves, he couldn't stop his eyes from drifting to land upon the locked drawer. There they lingered, longer than he would have liked, before he forcibly tore his gaze away from the desk entirely.

He set his sights to the side of his bed where his dirty and worn sneakers sat. He frowned. That wouldn't do! He swiped them up and entered the bathroom again to clean them up a tiny bit. He glanced around the room, looking for something he could use to wipe them down. Finding nothing, he resorted to using the filthy towel he had put in the washing basket the day prior. Cringing at the dark crimson stains on the otherwise blue towel, he turned on the tap and began to clean up his shoes. Once he was done, he dropped the ruined towel back into the washing basket and slipped on his now shinier shoes. He took a moment to admire the deep red shoes with the white straps secured with scratched, golden metal buckles in all of their scuffed up glory.

As he re-entered his room, heading for the bedroom door, he paused to glance at himself in the mirror. He looked infinitely brighter and much neater than he had been before. His fur was glossier and he noticed that he hadn't even had to force the liveliness into his emerald eyes today. His blue ears were perked up and his quills were relaxed. A smile, a _real_ smile, landed on his muzzle as he made for the door.

Perhaps today would be the day that things started changing for the better.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two

No one was up.

Subconsciously, Sonic glanced at the digital clock on the oven door as he grabbed a glass from the cupboard. 5:34. No wonder Tails was still asleep – it was _way _too early. Not that it mattered to Sonic, of course. He'd been waking up at five in the morning on the dot for weeks now. Glancing out the window, he watched the slowly brightening sky turn a subtle shade of pink. The cotton candy clouds, all wispy and soft looking, made him feel sour for a moment. He realised that it was likely because he was still feeling more than a little pissed about his recent inability to get some sleep; the clouds reminded him of his soft, white pillow.

Wow, not even the slightest temptation to go back upstairs hit him. Usually it would if he thought about the comfy, warm embrace of the blankets on his bed and the feeling of the pillow against his head after a long day. Now: nothing. Now, only the unconscious need to stay awake filled him. It certainly was an odd feeling, one that he wanted to eradicate entirely.

When had he lost his ability to sleep again? A few weeks ago? A few _months _ago? Surely, it could not have been longer than a year… right? Maybe… maybe it was. It was hard to pinpoint the moment everything just stopped.

He did, however, feel as though it had happened shortly after he started to see **him** in the mirror again. **His** mocking, sharp-toothed grin and unforgiving eyes sometimes flashed in the mirror in the corner of his vision. It had come out of the blue one day, but he knew he was seeing it, hell, he wasn't_ that_ crazy yet, but there was nothing he could do about it. There was no one he could physically track down and stop. No, **he** was already inside his head. And **he** seemed to be there to stay.

There was no getting rid of **him**, clearly. He'd tried before but **he** was back now. He refused to tell Knuckles, he was afraid of appearing weak in the eyes of his friends and he knew that he could deal with it himself. He just had to.

The sound of glass smashing brought him back to reality as he jolted out of his trance. He had dropped the glass onto the tiled kitchen floor, the many sharp pieces now lying, scattered, across the ground. Sonic winced, his blue ears flattening slightly. He perked them up to listen towards the stairs for any sign of Tails.

A few moments went by and he heard nothing. He thanked Chaos silently that he didn't seem to have woken his brother up before glaring down at the mess he made.

'Great…' he growled in his head, his decent mood thoroughly ruined.

He bent down to pick up the shattered glass, ignoring how occasionally the glass would prick his skin and send jolts of pain shooting through his hand. He paid it no mind; he was used to it.

Once he was done, he glanced at the tap – he wasn't thirsty anymore. Disgruntled, he gradually made his way to the front door, hoping to clear up his mood with a lengthy run. Ordinarily, the blur of green grass beneath his feet, broken up only by the odd burst of colour from the flowers, would calm his mind and stop the negative thoughts from festering. Maybe it would work this time too.

One look out the door rapidly changed his mind.

Stone-grey clouds that had seemingly appeared from nowhere had began to form on the horizon. They would bring rain, he was sure of it. He abhorred rain. It was almost as if the weather had turned in response to his own mood which were, predictably, getting worse and worse by the second. How long had he been standing in the kitchen…? He didn't suppose it mattered much. How stupid he was to cling to the hope that things would get better… who was he kidding? They never get better.

"I guess when you're falling, you can only go down…" he muttered bitterly, 'until you hit the pavement that is.' He added mentally.

He refrained from slamming the door, despite how much he longed to, for his sleeping brother's sake, then moved to the front room where he collapsed on the soft, grey settee there. Huh, _soft and grey_…

How ironic. He truly couldn't catch a break.

He tried to find something to take his mind off recent events, but he found that he could not. **He** _really_ wasn't making this easy on him… but, then, I guess that was **his** purpose.

(I'm back a "little" earlier than last time! By the might of the gods, I think the world is ending!

Anyway... This is a shorter chapter than the last one, but I had some inspiration so I thought I'd roll with it. I'd love to hear your thoughts!

~Fortune)


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

Tick. Tick. Tick.

His eye began to twitch in sync with the ticking of the clock. Before long, that very same clock may mysteriously find its way smashed outside against a tree if it kept up its infernal ticking. But he couldn't do that. He wouldn't. Afterall, there would be no point; he'd just have to replace it again anyway after being yelled at by Tails for twenty solid minutes. No, better to leave it where it was. He shook his head, trying to ignore the infuriating noise.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

His hand gripped the settee beside him so hard he was surprised it wasn't ripped up yet. He couldn't sit here in complete silence, it wasn't his style. He debated the risk of getting drenched on that run he'd wanted earlier, but hastily shoved the thought aside.

'Not worth it.'He'd told himself.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

He hadn't even realised it, but his leg had started to tap on the hardwood floors. Wait, hardwood? Oh yeah, that's right, they hadn't re-carpeted the front room yet. He knew there was something they'd forgotten in here…

Tick. Tick. Tick.

His ears flicked back in annoyance. He really wished Tails would just wake up already, he couldn't sit here by himself like this. He never could. He remembered trying time after time, but he could, on no occasion, sit still for long – drove him up the wall it did, sitting still.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

"That's it!"

He was up off the settee in an instant, jumping up like a popped popcorn kernel. Glaring up at the analogue clock of the left wall, he spun around and marched for the door.

"Screw it! I'll take my chances with the damn rain." He growled, hand already on the rickety doorknob.

He swung the door open, his resentment for the ticking clock overriding all sense of logic. A curtain of rain smacked him in the face the second the door was open, but he was too irked to care anymore. Sprinting into, instead of away from, the storm for what may have been the first time ever, he ignored the way the rain made his fur awkwardly cling to his thin frame. The rain was getting into his eyes too, making it difficult to see. He was past the point of caring.

Until…

Slip. Slide. Crash.

He groaned in agony. He'd skidded in the mud and collided with a tree, full force. It was honestly a miracle he hadn't broken anything.

"A-ah!"

Scratch that, he hadn't broken _much_. Just maybe his arm… and his pride.

He hissed. He wouldn't've slipped at all if the rain hadn't have blinded him… no, he wouldn't've slipped if he'd have just stayed inside to begin with. Why had he left? Why couldn't he just deal with hanging around the house until his brother woke up? What was his problem?

He was actually a tad bit appreciative of the tree as it helped to shield him from the brunt of the downpour. Pushing himself up against the trunk, one arm pressed protectively against chest, he attempted to get himself into a comfortable sitting position. He failed in his effort to make himself comfortable, but at least he was sitting up now. He squinted through the haze of rain, struggling to identify exactly where he was.

For a while he just sat there, motionless. Any movement could agitate his freshly broken arm. He sighed. He had too much energy all the time that he just couldn't wait. Maybe that's why he wasn't getting any sleep recently – he wasn't burning off the excess energy flowing through his system.

But then, if that was the case… where'd the extra boost of energy _come from_…?

**Him**.

It had to be **him**, there was no other explanation. **He **truly was the one messing with him. But, how? Why? He thought that he was rid of him ages ago. Unless… unless **he** never left in the first place.

His blood suddenly ran cold through his veins, his face paling and an involuntary shiver shooting up his spine and not because of the cold from the rain. He was almost numb to the rain at this point, his brain more focused on the horrifying realisation that **he **had been with him the entire time. **He **was merely lying dormant this whole time, making him and his friends believe that he was gone.

But **he** wasn't. **He** wasn't gone. **He **wasn't going anywhere. **He **was ready to play. Sonic immediately decided that he wasn't a fan of this game.

Fleetway was back. And he wasn't going _anywhere_.

(This isn't a particularly long chapter, but I had some inspiration and decided to role with it... also helped that I was doodling and came up with the perfect cover too!

~Fortune)


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